IAN SADLER

Ian Sadler is a Canadian concert organist and choral director.

Since taking first Prize in the USA's International Organ Playing Competition in Syracuse in 1986, Ian has devoted himself to the concert platform with organ recitals in Britain (Westminster Abbey, King's College Chapel, Cambridge), France (Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris), USA, Belgium, Holland, Sweden, Austria, Germany, the Czech Republic, Italy, Hungary, and Denmark. In Canada, he has performed in inaugural series on new concert hall organs, including in Toronto's Roy Thomson Hall, Calgary's Jack Singer Hall, and the Winspeare Centre in Edmonton. As a regular performer in the North American International Liszt Festival, Ian has performed the complete organ works of Liszt, Mendelssohn, Schumann, and Reubke. In 1999, he represented Canada as the first Canadian member of the International Jury for the Liszt Organ Playing Competition in Budapest, Hungary.

Ian has performed concertos with The Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, The Hamilton Philharmonic, and The Toronto Philharmonic Orchestra and with the Timmins and North Bay Symphony Orchestras. Ian's discography is extensive with a series of CD's on major organs in Toronto (Thomson Hall, Yorkminster Park Baptist Church, and St. James' Cathedral), a CD from Stratford of organ recital favourites entitled 'The Sadler Selection' and a CD devoted to the music of Mozart for the 250th Anniversary Celebrations. In 1999, Ian won a Juno Award. He has further recorded many programmes for the CBC and was featured last year on BBC's Radio 2 performing the organ music of Vaughan Williams. Ian's CD “Romantic Music for Organ Vol. I,” which was recorded at St. James' Cathedral in Toronto, was released in February 2008. In March, he recorded a further CD on the fine historic Casavant organ of St. John's Cathedral, Newfoundland.

Plans for 2009–2010 include 2 further solo CDs --- one dedicated to the music of Mendelssohn for his 200th anniversary --- a recital tour in Australia and New Zealand, and further concerts in Denmark and Sweden and in the USA in New York, San Francisco, and Hawaii.

Born in England, Ian began his musical training as a boy chorister for five years at St. Paul's Cathedral, London. He attended The King's School, Canterbury from where he won the Organ Scholarship to Bristol University. During postgraduate study at London University, Ian was Organ Scholar at St. Paul's Cathedral for two years. Before moving to Canada, his final engagement in the UK was to play the organ in the movie Chariots of Fire. In 1980, Ian moved to Canada following his appointment as Director of Music at Toronto's Grace Church on-the-Hill and Choral Director at Upper Canada College.

Ian is Artistic Director of the Stratford Concert Choir, founder and conductor of the Stratford Children's Concert Choir, and Director of the Cathedral Singers of Ontario.
For his dedication to promoting the organ and Canadian music, both at home and abroad, The Royal Canadian College of Organists honoured Ian in 2007 with their highest award, “Fellow of The Royal Canadian College of Organists.”